Information storage devices are used to retrieve and/or store data in computers and other consumer electronics devices. A magnetic hard disk drive is an example of an information storage device that includes one or more heads that can both read and write to a spinning disk media, but other information storage devices also include heads—sometimes including heads that cannot write.
Disk drive reliability can be enhanced by control of humidity and/or contaminants within the disk drive enclosure, which may otherwise adversely affect the head/disk interface. For example, disk drives have been manufactured with internal desiccant materials and/or adsorptive materials within, to reduce the migration of excessive lubricant, contamination, and/or moisture to the head/disk interface. However, if a desiccant material is installed too long before finally sealing the disk drive enclosure during manufacture, then the desiccant material can be degraded by humidity in the manufacturing environment (e.g. clean room moisture uptake by the desiccant). Hence there is a need in the art for a means to introduce a desiccant or adsorptive material into a disk drive quickly and late in the manufacturing process.
Some disk drives are hermetically sealed, for example so that an alternative gas (e.g. helium) can be retained within the disk drive. However, a sealed disk drive may have a high internal relative pressure (relative to the external barometric pressure), which could undesirably blister a cover seal if a large enough area hole were underneath. Hence, there is a need in the art for a means to introduce a desiccant or adsorptive material into a disk drive quickly and late in the manufacturing process of a hermetically sealed disk drive, with reduced or avoided blistering of a cover seal.